Sacrifice In Barbara Kingsolver's Poisonwood Bible

Each of the Price women are dramatically changed by their experience in the Congo, but the most prominent change is seen within Leah and Orleanna. Brother Fowles’ visit plays a crucial role in their transformation. During

The writer's view of Orleanna fits with Orleanna's narrative throughout the book. In the first book, “Genesis” in parallel to the Bible, Orleanna is unaware of the dangers that are to be presented to her in the near future, and is clouded by the judgements of her all-knowing husband, but by the end of the Poisonwood Bible in Exodus, Orleanna has developed by listening to her own conscience and freeing herself from Nathan, who could otherwise be compared to the grasp that religion can have on vulnerable

Orleanna is the mother of four daughters and her being this character as well as her personality of being caring and invested in others creates her purpose for the story as retelling the story of her family and their trip to the Congo. She is creating this scene to show what happened and how she has learned from this experience and hopes to improve others lives based on her experiences. In the political allegory, Orleanna is the person in the world who has seen the wrong doing’s of the world, in this case the imperialism of countries, and advises those to step up and support the cause bettering lives of those less fortunate. Her character creates a call to action through the miseries she has seen her family struggle through. The author’s purpose in writing The Poisonwood Bible is to not only show the different influences and outcomes that colonialism has on people and nations, but to also show that it is wrong and not necessarily the superior way of doing something. Orleanna is the spokesperson for how the colonialism is wrong and something must

how Nathan’s neglect of his family affected Orleanna greatly. “ For six years, from age nineteen

breaks free from Nathan. Even though Orleanna finds her freedom, she loses her faith. Orleanna

There is strong juxtaposition in The Poisonwood Bible when it comes to American versus Congolese culture. While Mama Mwanza is viewed as equal in the Congo for her disability, Adah is considered an outcast in American society because of her hemiplegia. Ruth May talks about Mama Mwanza’s disability as if it is something strange, yet she reveals that the people living in their village do not look at Mama Mwanza as any different from them. She says that “Why, they just don’t let on, like she was a regular person. Nobody bats their eye when she scoots by on her hands and goes on down to her field or the river to wash clothes with the other ladies that work down there every day.” The phrasing of this implies that the Price family looks at Mama Mwanza

No one shows the oppression, inflicted upon the Congo’s people in hope of spreading imperialism, better than the main characters in this story. Nathans only goal is to convert all of the native people’s beliefs to Christianity. By hoping to doing this, they will be able to grasp control and establish their dominance upon the village. This can be seen through Orleannas thoughts, “Call it oppression, complicity stupefaction, call it what you’d like, it doesn’t matter. Africa swallowed the conqueror’s music and sang a new song of her own” (Kingsolver 385). Kingsolver shows that individuals are always going to want and demand control, however the victims of this oppression will fight past it and won’t give in. Many people have come before the Price family, trying to do the same thing. However, the natives are smarter than to give into their new ideologies.

This can be read as a religious allegory because it talks about the Baptist missionaries. They had to deal with the rejection from the Congolese people. The Congolese people rejected the religion and the Price family since they were white. The Price family also had to deal with the same diseases and situations as the people of the Congo. They had to sleep with mosquito nets or the mosquitos would have eaten them alive. Some of the Prices (Leah, Adah and Orleanna) almost got eaten by

In the end, the neck you save will be your own… What I feel down in my bones is the this is not a Christian kind of place. This is darkest Africa.” (Book 6, Chapter) Overall religious arrogance affected all the prices when arriving at the Congo, they came with the belief that everyone’s problems will be fixed by being on gods gracious side, yet nothing was fixed, this caused the price girls to begin losing faith and gaining an arrogance that their new beliefs are most correct.

Throughout a lifetime, many things are gained; experience, wisdom, knowledge, as well as a sure sense of self. But along with all these great things come regret, guilt, and shame of past events. Everyone deals with these in different ways, sometimes turning to religion and denial as coping mechanisms. In the novel The Poisonwood Bible, By Barbara Kingsolver, each member of the Price family deals with a personal guilt either gained while on their mission in the Congo or long before. This novel exemplifies the different types of guilt the Price family experienced throughout their stay in the Congo, and shows various means of reconciliation and forgiveness as the guilt is absolved.

As their journey to and through the Congo is just beginning it is already seen that compromise will be the key source for survival. The Congo did not have much to offer the Price family, though Leah has high expectations for it. She “expected everything: jungle flowers, wild roaring beasts. God’s Kingdom in its pure, unenlightened glory.” ( Kingsolver, 17) The Congo is already revealing an expectation Leah would never have found between the pages of a King James version, the rewiring of her thoughts on equality and her inner need to fight for justice are compelling emotions that are overtaking her. She can see that this place poses a potential challenge much greater than anything a hot Georgia summer put her family through. Still measuring her worth in the few short breaths her father permits her, Leah is still determined the Congo would not stop her from gaining the acceptance of her father. “If only I could ever bring forth all that I knew quickly enough to suit father” (Kingsolver, 37), but little did she know that nothing her female mind could do or say would suit the righteous Nathan Price. Similar to The White Man’s Burden, once given the thought of superiority nothing “beneath’ that was beneficial. Leah’s cognitive thought process is starting its shift into survivor instead of

Initially appearing as a devout Christian Mr. Price slowly reveals his controlling personality. This characteristic is a direct source of the abuses he imposes upon his family, whether mentally or physically. The reader begins to realize this fact during conversations, especially about one’s about faith. If threatened, Nathan Price lashes out, and uses his beliefs as attacks against his children, but mostly his wife. Orleanna Price is wedded to Nathan Price, and is the subject of his cruelty. As a housewife, Mrs. Price is a direct result of Mr. Price’s controlling behavior, as illustrated in the conversation with the Underdowns. In an tempt to flee the country, Orleanna reaches out, but is quickly reminded of her place by a sarcastic remark from Nathan: “ ‘What is it you’d like to say, for your own part’ “ (Kingsolver 168). Mr. Price understands the grip he has upon his wife, and utilizes it to his full advantage, destroying her free will. Furthermore, he inflicts abuse upon his wife, both mentally and physically. Demonstrated by frequent arguments between the two, the result is usually a slap and/or comments that drain the life the life from Mrs. Price. At the end of a conversation between wife and husband about the attitude of Anatole, Mr. Price begin to scream at Orleanna for mocking him, followed by Nathan “grabbing her

The family consists of Orleanna, her husband Nathan, and their four daughters: Rachel, Leah, Adah, and Ruth May. The only characters who actually speak in the book are the girls. Rachel has the most negative view of Africa out of the five voices, calling the Congo a “heathen pandemony” before she has even lived there for a day (Kingsolver 6). Her superficial needs and utter disrespect for the natives of Africa show that she has no appreciation for the Congo and even that she believes it is beneath her. The opinions of her sister Leah on the same subject completely juxtapose the ones of Rachel. Leah sees the inner beauty of the Congo and she even embraces the cultural aspect of living in Africa. Leah joins the village hunt when they run out of food, even though she is a girl and it is atypical for girls to do that. She ultimately marries a Congolese man named Anatole, and lives out the rest of her life in Africa. While these two characters are vastly different from each other, they each experience the Congo in different ways, so neither of their viewpoints are wrong. This message that Kingsolver uses the characters to tell also applies to Africa itself; the people who live there see nothing wrong with their lives, but the rest of the world see them as uncultured and

When one thinks about sacrifice their minds tend to think of it as noble deed that highlights what they value. They view it as the person has sacrificed something that is important for the greater good. However, this is not always the case and sometimes sacrifice can take people down some very dark paths and not only ruin their own life, but the lives of others around them. In The Poisonwood Bible, multiple characters made sacrifices that were sometimes good and sometimes bad. The bad instances caused a lot of problems in the book. Throughout the book Nathan Price sacrificed his family’s life in America which showed how far he was willing to go to display his values, which would turn out to be his hamartia.

Father-daughter relationships are commonly filled with unconditional love, but an adolescent's complete devotion can be abused by an unfit parent. In Barbara Kingsolver's The Poisonwood Bible, the devout baptist minister Nathan Price traverses the luscious African country of the Congo along with his wife Orleanna and their four daughters: Rachel, Leah, Adah, and Ruth May. One of the Price girls, Leah, is introduced as having an indescribable adoration for her disparaging dad. However, as Leah matures into a young women, Nathan's racist, misogynistic, and all-around despicable acts turn what was once an affectionate worship for her father into an unaffected scorn.